Miss Hargreaves

by Frank Baker

  Stifled by the great fire, feeling almost incapable of speech or movement, I struggled up from my chair.

  ‘I’ll leave you to discuss the concert,’ I said wearily.

  ‘Yes. It would be as well for you to retire early,’ said Lady Hargreaves. ‘By the way, before you go–what was the name of that most interesting young man–a friend of yours who came to the station with you? Henry–something. I cannot remember.’

  ‘Henry Beddow,’ I said.

  ‘Beddow. Ah, yes! I must make a note of it.’ She turned to father again, taking her manuscript from the chair and holding it out before him. I wandered out to the coat-cupboard.

  ‘This bar,’ I heard her saying, ‘is very subtle. Observe how the theme, now inverted and accelerated, creeps in to–’

  ‘And it ends niente, you see,’ said father. ‘And by niente I mean niente. Want you to notice how–’

  I took the beard, the hat, skull-cap and coat, closed the door behind me, crossed the road and wearily went home to bed. I felt that years had been added to me.

  Destructive thought destroys. But it had failed to destroy. What I realized was this; it is a thousand times more difficult to destroy than to create. You will laugh and say I am mad; that destroying is far easier. But it isn’t so. Try to destroy anything try to annihilate it. Burn it and consider the ashes. Then consider how easily you create. Every time you open your mouth you create something. The chord of D flat major sounding to infinity from father’s little Bord. How do you destroy that? What was Miss Hargreaves? She was the embodiment of my lie. It was no good my just trying to will that lie away. It was, that lie; it absolutely was. Some formula had to be found; something that would cancel the lie from the very beginning. Could it be done in Lusk church? Could it? And what was the formula?

  Those were my thoughts as I lay on my bed that night.

  About midnight father came in without knocking. Father never knocks.

  ‘My God!’ he said, ‘she’s a grand woman! Congratulations, my boy! If I had my time over again, I’d–I’d be damned if I’d stop at lizards.’ (I wondered how much of that cognac was left.) ‘What the devil do you mean,’ he snapped suddenly, ‘wearing beards and skull-caps? She says she’s going to put a specialist on to you. Better wait till after the concert. She’s agreed to let you play. We’ve got to practise this damned fugue of hers. Funny. Found we’d both known Hardy quite well. She says she comes in one of the novels and, of course, as anybody knows he put me in “Far from the Trumpet Major”. Must read the others and see where she comes in. Hope she’s not Tess. Don’t want to see her hanged. Good night, my boy. Congratulations. She’s no ghost.’

  Over the tankards in the Happy Union:

  ‘I ’ear tell as ’ow th’ ’ole bitch’ve bin sent ’ere by those I.R.A. devils . . .’‘

  She’m no woman at all. All that ’obbling about on sticks never did take me in . . .’

  ‘Serve the old Dean bloody well right if the Cathedral was blown sky ’igh. . . .’

  Over the teacups in the Close:

  ‘My dear Mrs Auty, I wouldn’t say a word against her. But the most extraordinary story is . . .’

  ‘Of course, Miss Linkinghorne, these Irish titles are most remote and . . .’

  ‘Nonsense, my dear! Women of that age don’t carry bombs about . . .’

  ‘But, my dear Mr Dean, I saw her myself, making plans of the Cathedral and . . .’

  In the lay-clerks’ vestry:

  ‘Always knew she was a bloody Guy Fawkes ever since I saw that ’at . . .’

  And in the choir school:

  ‘Say, chaps, have you heard? Old Hargy’s an anarchist. Fact!’

  ‘Go on! How do you know? . . .’

  ‘What’s an anarchist, anyway? . . .’

  ‘Old Meaks says he saw her trying to get down into the crypt with a black bag. It was ticking too, he swears to it . . .’

  So the tale flickered, from a spark to a cinder, from a cinder to a flame. Within a week, whenever Connie went abroad, she was the victim of curious and resentful eyes. God–how I suffered! More, I swear, than she did. Innocently sketching the Cathedral from Meads one fine autumn afternoon, a lout from the town threw a clod of earth at her and quickly disappeared. With great dignity, Connie brushed her clothes, gathered up her sketching materials and returned home. For three days she did not leave the house. The flame of rumour grew to a bonfire of fact. There was an Irish maid at Lessways. Yes, that settled it. Hargreaves must go. The town spoke as one man.

  On the fourth day she dropped her bomb. It appeared in the form of a letter in the Cornford Mercury.

  ‘To the Editor.

  ‘SIR,–Recently you were good enough in your columns to welcome me to the ancient Cathedral town of Cornford whither I had come to reside. I was proud to become a resident of Cornford and I looked forward to many happy years here. But what has happened? You, sir, must know only too well. I have become the victim of a cruel and malicious rumour which threatens to undermine my very existence here. I am not deaf. I have heard what is being said about me. I am, I understand, associated with bombs. Ridiculous as I regard this, there are apparently some people who believe it. I can no longer, therefore, be expected to remain silent.

  ‘I know full well how this wicked rumour arose. I am able to refute it and I shall take immediate steps to do so. Let the lying tongues cease before hot burning coals fall upon them.

  ‘Meanwhile, the honour of Cornford is at stake. Is it to be said that she drove an old lady beyond her ancient walls because of the wickedness of a deceitful pen?

  ‘The poison of asps is under her lips, sir. The poison of asps is under her lips.

  ‘HARGREAVES.’

  Mother ran up to father’s room early one evening with the paper in her hand. We were rehearsing for the concert, only a few days ahead now.

  ‘Look at this!’ she cried. ‘It’s all round the town. Nobody’s talking of anything else.’

  We read the letter. ‘H’m,’ said father. ‘Can’t understand why towns are always female.’

  I said nothing. She’d attack now, I told myself; she’d attack.

  ‘I must say,’ said mother, ‘I think it’s rather splendid of her. Don’t you, Norman?’

  ‘Yes. Fine,’ I said uncomfortably.

  ‘Whatever she is, whoever started that story ought to be horsewhipped. Horsewhipped! I can’t bear that sort of thing. Of course, I never did believe it.’

  ‘A few days ago, mother,’ I said, ‘you said you wouldn’t put anything beyond her.’

  ‘Of course, I never meant it.’

  ‘You go along now, Dorothy,’ said father, ‘we’re busy’.

  ‘I do think you ought to go and see her, Norman,’ said mother. ‘Ask her to come to tea if you think she’d like to. It would show people that we don’t believe this absurd tale. I hear Mrs Auty’s been spreading the most awful stories. How I do hate those Close people!’

  ‘Honestly, mother, I think she’d prefer it if I left her alone.’

  ‘I do think she might have asked Jim and me to come to her concert. If you went over now, Norman, and asked her in to tea, and said how sorry you were about this awful gossip, she’d probably give us invitations to her concert. It would serve Mrs Auty right to find us all there. Anyway, I should like to hear father play properly for a change.’

  ‘Always play properly,’ said father. ‘Norman, there’s a bar you haven’t filled in here, you devil.’

  ‘No, mother, if you don’t mind. I won’t go just now.’

  ‘Well, you are a queer boy. I shall never understand you.’

  Mother turned and went out. Father shouted after her, ‘See my dinner-jacket thing is pressed, Dorothy; and sew up the moth-holes.’

  Father and I went on with Connie’s Canzona. It was a rather sticky composition–Spohr at his jammiest–full of pretty work in six sharps and a good many double ones. You had to cross the hands. As I crossed mine I looked at them gloomily and wondered
how long it would be before they were handcuffed. Sure as nuts, Connie would attack now. I knew it.

  Cathedral towns are funny, fickle places. The day after Connie’s letter had appeared in the Mercury, she drove up the High Street. It was four days since she had been seen abroad. Stopping in the market, she got out and, with Austen’s help, purchased a number of potted cinerarias from a stall in Disraeli Square.

  Connie was news, of course; more news than ever since the publication of her letter. At her appearance in the centre of the town at the busiest hour of the week, tongues which had been wagging for days–some in support of her, many more against her–suddenly stopped wagging. You almost felt that the drivers of buses and cars would stop their engines.

  I had just come out of the bar of the Swan and I stopped, watching her as with minute care she examined the cinerarias, handing some over to Austen, dismissing others. She did not see me. Finally she handed a ten-shilling note to the woman at the stall and, refusing the change, turned slowly back towards her car.

  All this time she had behaved as though the people of Cornford didn’t exist, although she must have been acutely aware that everybody was looking at her. Suddenly, as she stepped up into the car, somebody–they said it was young Sanderson, son of the old man who was now head-gardener at Lessways–sang out at the top of his voice:

  ‘Three cheers for her ladyship!’

  There was a second’s silence. My heart beat wildly. Which way would Cornford turn? Then there was a roar of cheering. Bowing graciously, she paused on the step of the car and raised her hand. A mighty silence fell. She might have been Queen Mary.

  ‘Thank you, my friends,’ was all she said. Still bowing a little, still smiling, she got back into the car and Austen slowly accelerated to the usual thirty-five.

  From that moment Constance Lady Hargreaves could do no wrong.

  I never expected she would spare me. She didn’t. This is what happened.

  That afternoon father was out and Squeen and I were in charge of the shop. I had a vile headache, and I don’t wonder.

  About three o’clock the Dean came in. My heart fell. I’d never been easy in the Dean’s presence; I was less easy now.

  Squeen buzzed busily round him, of course.

  ‘Would Mr Dean like to see a very nice clean set of Jeremy Taylor’s Discourses? And would it please Mr Dean to know that his little monograph on the Cathedral glass was selling very well?’

  The Dean turned to me. ‘Huntley, put aside these Bampton Lectures of Hutton’s, will you? I’ll take those. Oh–what have we here? An early edition, eh–’

  He murmured away to some back shelves. He was in a very buying mood. After twenty minutes he’d selected a pile of a dozen or so books.

  ‘I’ll have them sent round, Mr Dean,’ I said, edging him nervously to the door. Sure as a bee smells honey I smelt trouble.

  ‘Oh, no.’ He smiled amiably. ‘Let us take them round to the Deanery now. Squeen can look after the shop, can’t he? You can help me carry them.’

  ‘Oh, no–no–’ I protested. ‘I couldn’t dream of your carrying them, Mr Dean. I–’

  But he hitched three volumes under his arms and was piling the rest upon me. ‘Come along,’ he said. And from the tone of his voice I knew I should have to go along.

  We walked slowly up Canticle Alley (not a favourite place of mine nowadays) and out into the Close.

  ‘And how are you getting on with your music?’ he asked, as we came within sight of the Deanery arches.

  ‘Oh, not so bad, thank you, Mr Dean.’

  ‘Have you taken your diplomas yet? The Royal College, isn’t it?’

  ‘No. Not yet, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Really? I quite thought you had. Oh, come in–bring the books in. Yes, put them on the table. Have you seen my dahlias, Huntley? I have quite a show. Come along.’

  It was a superb autumn day and the splendid garden, stretching away its long smooth lawns to the two great walnut trees at the bottom by the stream, had never looked more attractive. Slowly we walked down, the Dean waving his silk handkerchief at various shrubs and flowers and naming them in Latin for my benefit. I grew more and more uncomfortable. After all, I do like the Dean. I didn’t want to quarrel with him.

  We paused on a rustic bridge at the bottom and leant over, looking at the clear, thin stream where trout were darting from weeds to stones. The Cathedral clock chimed the half-hour. Thank heaven, at any rate, that I should soon have to get away for Evensong.

  ‘I wanted to have a talk with you,’ said the Dean suddenly, smiling still and blowing his nose. ‘I suppose you’re quite free now? I don’t wish to keep you from your work.’

  ‘Oh, yes, Mr Dean. That is–until Evensong.’

  ‘I can dispense you from that, can’t I, if I wish?’ He smiled at me almost warmly.

  I laughed feebly. ‘Yes, that’s right. So you can.’

  ‘Well, let us take the books up to the library. It is a little chilly, isn’t it? Dear me! I wish the Bishop would learn how to prune his plum trees! He is for ever complaining that he cannot grow fruit against that wall, and it is entirely his own fault. There are my dahlias. Fine, are they not?’

  My mind wandered. ‘Oh, quite, quite!’ I said, both absently and inadvisedly.

  He frowned. He blew his nose. He smiled.

  ‘You are quite a good mimic, aren’t you?’ he remarked gently. ‘But’–and suddenly his voice was as sharp as an east wind ‘let me remind you, Huntley, that mimicry has got people into very serious trouble. So have’–he looked at the Cathedral spire and paused before the next two words. Then he glared at me and added–‘an-on-y-mous let-ters.’

  Again he blew his nose. My heart sank to the bottom of my shoes. I said nothing. I couldn’t.

  We went into the hall. Carrying the books, we proceeded slowly and silently up to the library.

  It is a long, splendid room with a great Gothic window at the end, lit by coats-of-arms of former Deans, and framed by a long view of the garden with the Cathedral and the Thames meadows beyond. Lined along the walls are bookshelves, stacked with ancient books. A first-folio Shakespeare has a place of honour. Against the shelves are bureaux, cabinets, side-tables groaning under masses of papers. In the window-sills framed photographs of distinguished friends and many jars of flowers that day, golden–– rod, michaelmas daisies, dahlias, roses. A lovely room. It broke my heart to have to face trouble in it. I wished he could have taken me to the kitchen.

  ‘Now, sit down,’ said the Dean. He spoke kindly. ‘I think,’ he continued, standing in the middle of the floor as clergymen always do on such occasions, ‘I think you understand what I was referring to just now. Don’t misunderstand me, Huntley. I suppose a Dean can appreciate a joke against himself as well as any reasonably minded man. But when’–he paused, his voice rose–‘that joke–is directed against a lady, moreover a newcomer to Cornford, and a very honoured member of our Cathedral society then it goes–beyond the bounds of a joke and becomes what I can only describe as’–(business with handkerchief)–‘im-per-tin-ent and’–(approach of handkerchief to nose)–‘of-fen-sive!’ (Nose-blowing.)

  I bit my lip and said nothing. I fumbled with some keys in my pocket. The Dean continued:

  ‘I suppose you must be aware of the terrible things that have been said about Lady Hargreaves in this town in the last few days?’

  ‘Yes,’ I muttered.

  ‘She, very rightly, came to me about the matter. Most reluctantly she told me that all these dreadful rumours had their foundation in an anonymous letter which you sent to Mr Carver. I was most unwilling to believe this. But I promised her I would at least see you about it. I hope, Huntley–I hope with all my heart that Lady Hargreaves is mistaken.’

  He waited. ‘Well?’ he said.

  ‘It is true,’ I said.

  The Dean stared at me, pursing up his lips thoughtfully. ‘I also hear,’ he said, ‘that you actually’–the shadow of a smile crossed his face–‘imper
sonated’–here he frowned again–‘Canon Auty.’

  ‘Yes. That’s true too. I didn’t look much like him, though.’

  He walked abruptly to the window; then came back again to the centre of the room.

  ‘Huntley, are you–out of your senses?’ he asked. ‘I might as well tell you that Lady Hargreaves is convinced there is really something wrong with your mind. I–’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I’m dotty. That’s the truth, Mr Dean. Something’s gone wrong with me.’

  But he didn’t seem to approve of this idea.

  ‘Rubbish!’ he snapped. ‘I refuse to believe it. I have no desire to be hard on you, Huntley. I very willingly give you credit for the way you came to Lady Hargreaves’ assistance when you first had the privilege of encountering her at Oxford–’

  ‘Yes,’ I blurted out, ‘and what does she say about that? She says I bungled it. There’s gratitude for you! The old devil actually–’

  ‘Stop, Huntley! Stop!’

  Again the Dean walked to the window. This time he spoke from there, with his back turned to me. He spoke quietly and gravely.

  ‘We–you and I, Huntley–are both servants of this great Cathedral. I want you to remember that. It is our paramount duty to preserve it from even a breath of scandal.’

  There was a long silence. ‘Well, have you nothing to say?’ he snapped.

  ‘It’s–it’s like this, Mr Dean. She–I–that is–well’

  I could not go on. What was the good of trying to tell him the truth? I suddenly wished to God Father Toule had been the Dean.

  He left the window, sat at a bureau and slowly polished his spectacles with his silk handkerchief.

  ‘I will be quite frank with you,’ he said. ‘Lady Hargreaves is not a poor woman. You, it is well known, are in debt. Oh, yes–Huntley! I have to keep my eye on such matters, you know.’

  ‘I’ve never asked her for a penny!’ I cried. ‘If she says things like that I’ll–I’ll have her up for slander.’